Instapaper

• The save page bookmark works with Google Reader. That is, it saves the link I’m reading rather than the Google Reader web page.
• Page turn. Rather than display the page as a long, scrollable single page, Instapaper paginates the document. You can “turn” the page much as you do in iBook or the Kindle app.
• Progress indicators. I like that it shows roughly how long a document is and how much has been read.
• Clean, minimal interface.
• The trick of reading the current page to make site like NYTimes (with page view restrictions) or LWN (pay walls) is a great idea but not completely reliable.
• Recent updates have been less stable. Going from day to night mode — an otherwise nice idea — almost always crashes. Putting the app into the background often loses the current location (it returns to the end of an archived article).

Pocket

You’ve probably seen that it’s the Sinclair Spectrum’s thirtieth birthday today. There are lots of great retrospectives — this is probably the best single source I read — so I’m not going to rehash all that. But I thought it might be worth a few words of my own.

Like many Brits my age, the Spectrum was my first computer. Technically it was the family computer, but after a few weeks I was pretty much the only one who used it.

I’m not sure whether a “Crimson” sunset is too obvious an interpretation of the theme, but I couldn’t find a better image so you’re stuck with this one(!).

It was taken in Malta, just outside where I was staying in St Julians. The picture was taken on… gasp… actual film.

I know this picture isn’t going to win any prizes, but it’s literally true that it’s a view “From my window,” which is this weeks PhotoFriday theme. Instead it’s one of a series of shots I called “Asshole who park across my driveway” that I created last year when I was working from home a lot. Because we have our own space and don’t often have a car parked in it, people assume that they can just use the space in front. Really annoying those times where we do have a car to park…

So there I was, trying to be a good Internet citizen. I updated my web server to use the latest version of Linux and… Boom! It would display the first post and then just peter out.

Unfortunately I don’t have the time or patience right now to track down exactly what the problem is — presumably something to do with PHP — so here you go: a new theme. It’s one of the ones I considered before I switched last time. A bit more minimal, more monochrome than last time. I like the minimal, and the lack of colour makes the pictures pop a bit more so it’s not all bad.

“Rain” is a good PhotoFriday theme for someone, like myself, who lives in the UK. I could have taken a picture on pretty much any day, but this way taken in August last year. Um, actually, in Ireland rather than at home…

There’s no need to panic and rush to vote for my entry in last weeks challenge since I didn’t enter.

• Why the world needs introverts – “Introverts living under the Extrovert Ideal are like women in a man’s world, discounted because of a trait that goes to the core of who they are.”
• Rubber Duck Problem Solving – Asking the question often gets you to the answer. I should know… nearly 20k reputation on Stack Overflow but less than a dozen questions asked!
• A TED speaker’s worst nightmare – This is brilliant.

It started with this image. Or rather the glitch that you can see in the middle of the screen.

It’s one of the screens in a new app that I’ve been developing. There’s lots of hard stuff in there but this is the first problem that has really stumped me. What it appeared to be was this: a text view (UITextView) on a table (UITableView) showed a nasty glitch when you tried to place the curser in the text box.

• http://j.mp/y4VgND – For those that are interested: this is kind of technology I use in my day job. Tens of millions of records per day… http://t.co/ebMpRB7w
• http://testflightapp.com – @ellenich http://t.co/cTkoDDuE
• http://instagr.am/p/H66l8hyQmV/ – Groovy. http://t.co/DcuOQldA
• http://lanyrd.com/2012/lidg37/ – Hopefully making it to my first London iOS Developer Group meeting of the year tonight. http://t.co/NbKIMnTT #lidg

• http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/2012-03-06/ – “Our lawyer has instructed me not to listen to your product idea.” http://t.co/jDWArMa6
• http://www.etsy.com/listing/91617431/upcycled-apple-computer-pet-bed?ref=cat_gallery_10 – Heh, for @krider2010 and @shabba1973. “@CMoz: Niiiice http://t.co/Tm2wIvmT Cat & mac lovers will love this!! :D”
• ZX81.org.uk – Photography, opinions and other random ramblings by Stephen Darlington – I’m moving zx81.org.uk to a new server, so if things are a little glitchy there for a while, that’s why.